We Ask The Expert: Does Sex Rehab Work?

With the recent onslaught of celeb infidelity, we've seen the term "sex rehab" slinking into headlines with alarming frequency. David Duchovny kicked off the trend last year -- the 'X Files' star spent two months in treatment for his self-proclaimed sex addiction. Duchovny and wife Tea Leoni separated briefly but appear to be going strong months after their reconciliation.

Of course, the two gentlemen keeping sex rehab in the news right now are Tiger Woods and Jesse James; only time will tell if their efforts have paid off in the public eye (or in their blemished relationships). Because both men moved so quickly from scandal to treatment facility, we have to wonder -- is checking into rehab simply a gesture of remorse, or does the program really work?

Board certified sexologist Isadora Alman tells PopEater exclusively, "I think it is the cop-out du jour. Yes indeed, there is reparative therapy -- I wouldn't be a therapist for 25 years if I didn't think it worked. But so much of the celebrity rehabs like this one, like Tiger Woods, like a few others that have recently been in the news, are really a way of their publicists getting the person out of the hot-seat, out of the limelight and to take the heat off them. It's also a way for them to get out of taking responsibility for their behavior. 'Oh, the poor guy has a disease.'"

Alman, who writes the nationally syndicated advice column 'Ask Isadora,' adds: "The whole setup for addiction-ology is that the person is not responsible, that their disease is responsible. I am very much in a 'here and now' perspective, saying, 'You may have a bad habit, you may have a compulsion, you may have an escape mechanism, you can call it all sorts of things that is not a choice-ful, thoughtful behavior, but it is not an addiction, it's a behavior problem.' While they may get the help that they need in whatever expensive rehab facility they go to, I think essentially what it does is just get them off the hook."

The Girls on Pop discuss the merits of sex rehab:

Read the rest of the interview with Alman below:

Do you think day-to-day life in a rehab facility, with the benefit of group therapy, is in any way worthwhile? Does that counteract the negative aspect of disease blaming?
"It's really hard to say. I do see great value in group therapy. People get called on their bulls**t. It's not only their outraged partner or their publicity agent, it is other people on the same social strata. If Tiger Woods and Jesse James were confronting each other, that would be a lot more meaningful than if Joe Schmoe did it to either one of these big stars. But I don't know what goes on in the day-to-day facility. I've never been in one, and most of the clients I see don't take that escape route, because they wouldn't be my clients if they did. They come to see me because they know I'm going to say, 'Let's take responsibility for your behavior and look at why you are doing this and what you can do to not do it.' Not say, 'Oh, you're helpless.'"

Therapy for an addiction like substance abuse seems black and white -- the goal is to stop the behavior completely and permanently. How do you treat something like this? Certainly you can't tell just tell a sex addict to just stop having sex.
"If I get a call from a prospective client and they say to me, 'I am a sex addict, I am a porn addict, I am a compulsive user of prostitutes,' I tell them quite clearly I don't work in a 12-step model. I really work from a perspective of your being able to change your behavior by choice. If that's not the perspective that you want to take, if you believe in addictions to behaviors, rather than compulsive behaviors, or if you really like the 12-step model, I'm not the therapist for you. I self-select my clients. They're not going to define as a sex addict. They're going to define as somebody whose behavior is out of control, which is different. It may look like the same thing, but how you phrase it to yourself is going to make a huge difference in what you feel you can do about it."

If sex becomes 'bad,' how can a patient continue living a normal life after treatment?
"That's how I feel about a lot of these 12-step programs, like Sexaholic Anonymous. They're so sex-negative. I think it's really important for people who ... have really done something dreadful -- betrayed their wife, been caught in an act like the famous Hugh Grant with a street prostitute -- if they somehow or other have screwed up royally and the public has gotten a hold of it, whether they beat their breast and say, 'Why, why, why?' my approach is, 'Okay, now what are you going to do? What are you going to do when you're feeling lonely, feeling angry? How do you handle those feelings in a constructive way rather than a deconstructive way?'"

It's fairly constructive to be crack-negative, but it's very difficult, in the context of real life, to be sex-negative.
"You're absolutely right. Nor is it healthy to be sex-negative."

Do you believe these celebrities, aside from the suggestions of their agents and PR people... do you actually think somebody like Jesse James trusts sex rehab, or is this a gesture to the world and to Sandra Bullock?"I have no idea, because I only get what view media, like PopEater, presents to me. And I'm not terribly interested in this guy; he doesn't impinge on my life at all. He looks to me like someone who has not lead a very introspective life -- he acts out, he loses his temper, he's a publicity figure, he looks like he's kind of out of his league. All the things I see are just what's being presented to me. He may genuinely love his wife, feel he screwed up and genuinely want to change his ways. I have no idea. I just always am very suspect when the people disappear from the public eye -- we don't see Tiger for two months and now he comes back and he's doing what he does, which is what he's supposed to do. And when someone like the governor is caught with his hand in the cookie jar, I'm always rooting for them to say to anybody who asks, 'It's none of your business. I am a golfer, I am a governor, I am a publicity hound, whatever it is, and what I do with my private life is private.' So if they're going to play it out in public, I don't believe any of it."

Kudos to you -- I've been reading a lot of very specific observations by medical professionals and celebrity therapists, and it's killing me -- you can't genuinely call Sandra Bullock a "love addict," having never met her.
"I have a lot of feelings about a lot of media docs and advice columnists. It's what I call the Don Rickles school of advice -- 'You got a problem? Well screw you, buddy.' [Laughs] That's not how I've ever presented myself to my clients, or to the public when I write."

You've written this before: "Know your partner and know the character of your partner." In a case like this, you have to assume Bullock didn't know what she was getting into. A lot of people say "the woman always knows," but..."I don't believe that. And when you fall in love, you're not making the best choices. Your pheromones are working, you're thinking with your gonads. Jesse James, on the surface, does not seem like a great marriage bet. It doesn't look like a fabulous match made in heaven, but these things work out or they don't. Look at Susan Sarandon and her sweetheart of 23 years -- that didn't look like a match made in heaven, either, and it worked really well for as long as it did. Sandra may have known he was a scuzzball or seen him as a poor, sweet boy who was acting out -- we don't know how she saw him. But if you see your partner has a history or gambling, of screwing around, you worry a little bit, and you don't put all your emotional eggs in one basket."
When do you know your partner well enough -- should we be looking for a history of behavior?
"History of behavior, yes, but we all take a risk when we join up with another person and put our heart in their hands. We hope that they will treat it with respect and kindness and not stomp on it with a high-heeled boot. But we can't know. If, however, they've been married seven times, they've been involved in public fights with their previous partners, you get a pretty good, large, red flapping flag saying, 'Proceed with caution.' But it doesn't mean don't proceed -- people can change."

Can these two reconcile? Could a marriage like this get back together after being in this media circus?
"Absolutely. And what they need to do is go someplace, close the door, pull down the blinds and deal with each other face to face. After -- and here's a big point -- after having dealt with themselves. Whether he has to do it in a rehab situation and she has to do it crying in her best friend's arms, they have to look at how they were complicit in this huge blow-up that's all over every piece of media they see. How did they contribute to it? How can they prevent such misery in the future? And if they try to reconcile, they have to do it as much as possible out of the public eye and ask for privacy, demand privacy, or just clam up. They can't play out their lives in public and expect them to do any important work."

Have they discovered the gene causing sex addiction? Obviously not, since it doesn't exist - just like 'ggobal warming. If you believe it does I have a bridge for sale in Brooklyn. Call me for an insider price.

Those guys got caught with their pants down. One is no better than the other. Tiger should had never got married. His dad pushed him into the golf at a young age to fill his own dream. That boy as a child would had probably never been a golfer. Most kids in their teens would have been dating, he's practicing on a golf course, not normal I feel. Never had a chance to date and socialize with his peers. Now he want to do what he's missed during his late teens and early 20's. Now Jesse, this is not his first rodeo. He's cheated through all his relationships, so this is normally to him. He's just a dirt bag!

Rehab for sex addiction is for cheaters, who do not want to stop cheating and making it up as a disease. Buh humbug, a cheater is a cheater with or without going to rehab. It has something to do with being a cad, because they do not want to restrain themselves, like they always going for their gratification. Its not an addiction, but bad behavior.

20 years ago, I was briefly married to a guy who was in AA when I met him. Stupid me, I thought that was a GOOD thing. Well, a few months into the marriage, he uses my credit card to take his loser buddies to Atlantic City to gamble and party on MY dime and when I confronted him about it all he had to was, 'Sorry babe, not my fault. Got a disease. Blame the disease.' That was his favorite line and all the loadies I met from the AA meetings he dragged me to were all the same - nothing's ever their fault because they have a "disease". And it says so right there in the AA bible - the "Big Book", you're not responsible, you have a DISEASE. The only disease they have is poor character.

I think it's called a disease when it's convenient. And all those who claim it use it to their advantage every frk'g time. Users should be losers but somehow through their lieing, cheating, manipulating and outright stealing they seem to always end up on top. And yep it's - Sorry got a disease?

Wow...I dated a woman like that and thats what she would say ... "you don't get it... you're not sick like I am" What a line of crap. People with Cancer are sick. Drinking and Drugs you did that one on your own. Needless to say she's been LONG gone.

Lady ou are so off the rocker with your remark .. The 12 Steps of recovery in AA are far from using being an alcoholic as an excuse. maybe you should have hadnot the drink before attending a meeting - otherwise you would have heard something different. Well you know what they say loosers just attract another loser ... Your'it it ...

That's like the Catholic crook getting absolved in confession then going right out and doing it again. You have bad taste in men. The AA program NEVER says that. You may have a disease but the cure is the choice. The cure for alcoholism is quitting drinking. AA gives us the tools to do that easier and better and a lot more. Sorry about your losses. Maybe you should try al-anon to find out why you pick these guys. OR CODA.

Me Not You - you obviously have no clue about alcoholism or AA. It IS a disease, but the cure is choosing to not drink. I have been married to a recovering alcoholic for 32 years and the work he has done in AA has made him a better person, husband and man. Don't blab on about things when you know NOTHING about them.

You are totally wrong. AA teaches people that they ARE responsible for their actions. And the Big Book does not say you are not responsible. Just becase you got burned by one drunk that obviously did NOT get the program, you spout ignorant poison about a program that has helped millions actually accept responsibility for their afdtions. Sad.

Not one sentence in the Big Book refers to alcholism as a disease.In case you're interested, the AMA declared it a disease so they couold soak up more medical coverage to treat the "disease".Get your facts straight Sis.

Sure hope Elin runs as far away from Woods as she can. This guy is a sick puppy. They suggest these two get behind closed doors and deal with each other face to face! This has been an on going saga for at least 5 months now. And now, golf, is more important to him than his family. Run Elin........Woods is getting what he wants though....ATTENTION..